Scientists affiliated with the Marine Biological Laboratory (MBL) have identified a key molecule driving chemoattraction between sperm and egg cells in marine invertebrates. The study was recently published in Nature Communications.

Two papers by UMass Medical School Professor Oliver J. Rando, MD, Ph.D., shed new light on the processes of fertilization and epigenetic inheritance in mammals. Together, the research provides important insight into how epigenetics—the ...

A research team from the Center for Biomedical Research (CBMR), at the University of Algarve (UAlg), and Instituto Gulbenkian de Ciência (IGC), led by Rui Gonçalo Martinho (UAlg) and Paulo Navarro-Costa (UAlg and IGC) has ...

A new mixture of cryoprotectives allows for an unprecedented high motility of frozen rhinoceros sperm after thawing, report scientists from the Leibniz Institute for Zoo and Wildlife Research (Leibniz-IZW) in Berlin, Germany. ...

A research team reports a novel function of fibroblast growth factor 2 (FGF2), a self-renewal factor for spermatogonial stem cell (SSC) which is the origin of sperm production. Although it has demonstrated that both FGF2 ...

Infertility affects about 20 percent of the U.S. population and can be incredibly costly; it also costs the livestock industry billions of dollars each year. Researchers at the University of Missouri have found that zinc ...

In many animals, males pursue alternative tactics when competing for the fertilization of eggs. Some cichlid fishes from Lake Tanganyika breed in empty snail shells, which may select for extremely divergent mating tactics. ...

Cryopreservation is a freezing method of storing spermatozoa to be used for reproduction. Although it is widespread, there is an issue with the ice formation that occurs during the process, which ends up affecting sperm structure ...

Sperm are highly specialized cells adapted to achieve a single goal: fertilize an egg. Along the road to fertilization, sperm must embark on a lengthy journey to the female oviduct, avoiding several fatal stresses that occur ...

Sperm

The term sperm is derived from the Greek word (σπέρμα) sperma (meaning "seed") and refers to the male reproductive cells. In the types of sexual reproduction known as anisogamy and oogamy, there is a marked difference in the size of the gametes with the smaller one being termed the "male" or sperm cell. The human sperm cell is haploid, so that its 23 chromosomes can join the 23 chromosomes of the female egg to form a diploid cell. A uniflagellar sperm cell that is motile is referred to as a spermatozoon, whereas a non-motile sperm cell is referred to as a spermatium. Sperm cells cannot divide and have a limited life span, but after fusion with egg cells during fertilization, a totipotent zygote is formed with the potential to develop into a new organism.

The spermatozoa of animals are produced through spermatogenesis inside the male gonads (testicles) via meiotic division. They are carried out of the male body in a fluid known as semen. Mammalian sperm cells can live for up to 3 days inside the female reproductive system.[citation needed]

Sperm cells in algal and many plant gametophytes are produced in male gametangia (antheridia) via mitotic division. In flowering plants, sperm nuclei are produced inside pollen.